THE SPACE NAVY AU (18+)

"She belongs to me, she's mine," Twitch says, busy with cleaning Lu up but perfectly authoritative once more.

 

"That is so cute I could die, but unfortunately it's not gonna fly with Allocations and Payroll, so we're going to have to work out something a bit more official. We don't have to do that right away, though. Princess," you add kindly, putting a hand lightly on Twitch's shoulder, "I'm not going to hurt her. I'm your friend, even if you don't remember right now for some reason -- oh. I'm out of uniform. That'd be why. I'm Bel. Bel Kadros. Galley's matesprit." You turn to the frightened new kid with a smile. "What's your name, stranger?"

 

Ooooh gods you could just cry.

Miraculously, you don't, partially because you're trying to clean yourself up at the same time Twitchy is, but your hands are all shaky and you're hopeless. Instead, you take a furtive gulp of juice, which doesn't rinse your mouth out as much as you'd like, but it'll do until you find a loadgaper.

And then Twitchy says that, and you realize what she's been saying to him this entire time, and then you do almost start crying because those are words you'd normally associate with your ex, (and thank both your Lords she isn't around to see you like this) while she put one of many horrible, gaudy collars on you and led you around by a little chain at parties like you were some exotic pet. "She's mine," she'd say breezily, while she let yet another tipsy stranger fondle your earfins or pull up your shirt to get a look at your puny gills.

But when Twitchy says it, it's the sort of undeniable truth that rocks your thinkpan with its simplicity. You're hers. You were hatched for her, and that's that. You'd always read in silly romcoms about newly quadranted trolls "speaking serendipity" at each other, but you never thought you'd hear it with your own two spongeclots. Not you, never you. And for all she's behind you and being all distracted and adorable and shit, you couldn't feel any more protected than if she got up in the blueblood's face and started hissing.

Not that she'd need to. They're obviously all being bros together, these two, and the way he casually reminds her of who he is without even a hint of annoyance or awkwardness makes you think that maybe this guy isn't so bad. You're still reeling at the fact that, no, they're not gonna throw you out with the garbage. This guy said so, and he seems to have some kind of authority going on. You puked on somebody's boss's feet, and he didn't even growl at you or anything. Have you ever met a troll this chill before? You can't recall. Maybe it's his hair.

Soon your mess is all tidied away. You still haven't said a peep, only because the two of them are kinda talking at each other and your pan is too scrambled to get a word in edgewise, and also you kind of just want to hide under the table until the heat death of the universe. But then he introduces himself--Bel, huh, you wonder what it's short for--and you clear your throat.

"Lu. I'm Lu. Uh, Elusca Pontop," you croak, then belatedly add: "Sir." Calling someone sir is just weird, it feels weird in your mouth. He's smiling at you still, so you probably didn't fuck that up too bad. You look down at his shoes again, then back at his calm, curious face, and you nearly start sniveling right there. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry I fuckin' vommed all over you, I wasn't meaning to, I-I-I--" You give your head a little shake to clear it and flash him an immensely weary smile. "Fuuuck, my bro, I gotta be leveling at you, I'm so fucked up right now I dunno whether to scratch my watch or wind my ass, so's I'm all kinds of grateful that you're puttin' a pause on alla that registry noise, I just, I don't wanna cause no trouble man, you dig?" You squeeze your eyes shut and purse your lips against an acidic little burp that creeps up on you. "I'm a good girl, really, just put me somewhere and I'll get shit did. Oh, and thank you kindly, but don't even worry about no mediculler for me, I think I just wolfed shit down too fast, you know? Sir."

Which is a lie, sort of, but you think you'll be forgiven for that one. After that bullshit with Sal, you've had quite enough of medicullers for the time being. You're colder than a harpy's tit and your head hurts and you want to hide in a dark room for the next seven sweeps.

As you try to think of something else suitable to say, a bit of what Bel was saying earlier catches up to you: Galley's matesprit. Galley has a matesprit? You doubletake at Bel, and yep, you're imagining it. And it's hot. It involves glorious long hair everywhere and muscular blueblood shoulders and Galley's deep, deep voice and skinny hips--Fuck. And wow, ain't they opposites in all kinds of interesting ways: blue and yellow, friendly giant and bony asshole. They must fill the prettiest green colored buckets. They are obviously perfect for each other.

Then it occurs to you that there's a good chance that Galley witnessed you borfing on his reddest sweetheart and you lean back against Twitchy, cover your face, and quake with silent cackles. "Oh, I'm going to hell," you say to your moirail through your fingers. "Motherfucker's gonna wad me up in a lil' ball and throw me in the incinerator." Something about your tone implies that you don't mean Bel.

 

"Who will?" you ask casually as you sit down at the table with them. Some more things click. "Galley? You're the one who stumbled into his block when -- he thought you were one of Whitey's people. He said you didn't offer him any trouble and I let it go because he seemed satisfied with the outcome of the exchange. I wish he'd told me you were underage and unwell." You glance up and make a face at the nearest monitor camera, knowing he's watching. "Did Whitey really bring you, or did you stow away? Don't worry," you add again as her shoulders tighten. "You've got to know from Twitch's story that we don't throw kids back to their asshole bosses. When the Captain's back on duty he'll tell you the same."

 

Bel's phone crackles, then Galley says, wryly: "I was going to toss the baby clownfish back overboard for being undersized and unpalatable, but she's been taking care of Twitch pretty okay. And also she gave me a number of direct orders. While crying. Kind of hard to oust a highblood after that kind of shit. I mean I didn't even need a minder to make me feel bad about that."

"If you made her cry I'm going to blow you up, Helmsman," Twitch puts in.

Bel's phone spits a few yellow sparks at her and goes, "I'll blow your mom, Auxiliary Helmsman."

Twitch crackles all over with her own outraged set of sparkles, burning spots wherever the motes of energy ground themselves. Two or three singe Bel's phone case.

(lu next)

 

You can't stifle the thin, miserable noise in the back of your throat when Bel says all that, but he's told you repeatedly that they're not gonna space you, and you're beginning to almost believe that they won't send you back to your ex either. Nevertheless, your earfins droop and you sort of huddle up against Twitchy some as you gather your thoughts. You're just about to answer when Galley speaks up through Bel's phone. You flinch, and then your face heats up in embarrassed fury, which only worsens when you hear their exchange. Your eyes lock on the phone like it's what's solely responsible for all your woes, and you can imagine little rage flames in your eyes.

"I AM RIGHT MOTHERFUCKIN' HERE, FUCK YOU KINDLY," you yell at the phone, flipping it off for good measure. "You rude-ass lil' shit, where you get off callin' me a fuckin' clown fish for?" You spread your earfins wide with your fingertips and bare all your sharp little teeth. "I am a goddamn clown eldritch horror and I will eat yo face."

There is something about talking to this fuckstick that makes you forget about everybody else in the room, because now Twitchy and Bel and half the cafeteria just heard your shameless black provocations. Your first thought in response to the rush of hot embarrassment that floods you is BUT HE FUCKIN' STARTED IT, but in the awkward pause that follows, you deflate visibly and hunch your shoulders. "I ain't really gonna eat his face," you mumble to Bel.

Can someone Lords forbid die of shame? You feel like you might. Maybe you'll get lucky and they'll space you after all.

(galley and/or twitchy next?)

 

"If you're a horrorterror then I'm King Of The Taint-Wrangling Cosmos, but actually I'm a jenkass fucking carrier and you're eight," Galley retorts. "Wait three sweeps and eat my entire ass, nymph."

(Bel next)

 

"Okay, everybody lay off my phone," you grumble, rubbing your thumb over the brand new scorch marks. "Galley is either a kilometer and a half away from here, or he is three kilometers long and all around us -- or both, like a photon -- and I need this phone for work. Galley, sweetness, can you ask Lainey to cover for me for an extra hour? Tell her I'll owe her." You pat Lu's thin shoulder to get her attention, because she's still all snarleyface over her black crush on Galley. "Here's what we're gonna do. I'm taking you back to my quarters -- Twitch, you can come too, of course, I'll square it with your manager if you're supposed to be back on duty -- and Lu can get cleaned up and wash her clothes. I've got a washer/dryer unit of my own, perks of being an officer, and my ablution block is the one place on the ship Galley can't see. If you want to, I dunno, have a good cry, or pale jam or something. You can borrow my moirail's bathrobe, she won't mind.

"And then, once you're feeling a bit more yourself, we can figure out what to do with you, and whether I need to go kick Whitey's ass."

(lu next)

 

There is a snarl gathering in the back of your throat and for a split second you would like nothing more than to smash that smug-ass snarkvoiced GALL-HAVING MOTHERFUCKING MACHINE to tiny bits, but then Bel pats your shoulder and you remember that you're getting all hot and bothered over a phone and Galley isn't actually inside of it. You instantly go meek and quiet, your eyes going wider and wider throughout his speech. Oh. Oh wow. "Uhh. Um. A-alright, B-Bel--sir--much obliged, holy shit. Thank you so much."

(twitch?)

 

"You're a pretty good guy, for a highblood," Twitch says approvingly. She takes the last pizza grub and stands up, grounding the last of her charge into the snack, so it steams again.

"If I was on duty somewhere, my managers wouldn't have let me wander off, because I wouldn't come back," she reasons. "So since I'm out here with you, I'm either done with whatever work I was doing, or someone else is in trouble. Anyway I'm going to stick with Lu now."

(Bel?)

 

You chuckle at her judgement of you. "I guess that's why we're friends." As for being off duty, her reasoning is sound, so you nod. "Let's grab a cart." Lu doesn't look in much shape for walking.

It's not a long trip by personnel cart. Just a few minutes, and you're letting them into your quarters. Your dad pokes his head curiously in the back door to greet Twitch and make questioning sounds about Lu, but you shoo him back out. "Go play, I'll introduce you later. You're a little overwhelming when you're a surprise."

Pancho's bathrobe was a gift from you, and is tremendously silly. It's sunset pink with fluffy violet clouds and little winged sushi rolls flying around. You saw it in a catalog and bought it entirely in the anticipation of Pancho's baffled hoot-laugh when she first saw it, and she didn't disappoint. You know she won't mind you offering it to this skinny, shivering kid in hopes of cheering her up; Pancho would do the same.

(lu now)

 

You manage a wobbly little smile at Bel when he says that about being friends. Aw. You're glad Twitch has good people watching out for her. And honestly if you can barf all over a motherfucker and he doesn't chew out your ass, he's gotta be good people.

You lean a little on Twitchy as the cart starts its journey and let your eyes drift closed. It's comfy. Why isn't everyone using carts? Then again, you don't wanna imagine what the traffic jams and shit would be like. Do these carts have little horns? You think if you had a cart to yourself, you'd deck it out with a horn that played the theme to Troll Cops. You can't go wrong with Troll Cops.

You're so out of it by the time you're ushered into Bel's quarters that you just kinda gawk dazedly at the giant bird head and the rush of foreign excited curiosity that crawls all over your brain. Wow, it's been a long fucking while since you've heard anything but ship parasites and your mom (Cloris's lusus was a fucking freakass plant, and she made a point of never letting you near other lusii if she could help it) and the onslaught of new thoughts just sort of explodes painlessly in your face, like a puff of light bursting. You're sure if you were anywhere approaching normal it would have been like brass horns in your head, but right now everything's all floaty and strange, and you're tired. You walked lords even know how many miles and you barfed everywhere and you are very tired.

Before you can react fully to what happened, the big bird is gone. Ah well, if this ship has lusii in it, you might see him again. There is a small, hopeful part of you that's cautiously excited about the idea of having critters around you again. It's been so long that you almost forgot what flexing those particular pan muscles felt like, and you find you've missed it sorely.

You take one look at the bathrobe and bust up laughing. "Th-that is the cutest goddamn thing I have ever set my ganderbulbs upon."

 

Twitch is as interested in Bel's lusus as the reverse, and concludes— upon not being attacked— that they must already be friends. When Bel says 'go play' and shoos him out, she stands by the back door for a moment, trying to work out whether or not that was meant to apply to both of them. But then Lu and Bel leave the room, and she can't quite remember why she was tagging along with them anyway, and if it was important one of them should have said, so she jumps off the landing after the thunderbird. She catches up to him, flying in clumsy, unpracticed bursts, ruffles his headfeathers with a burst of static electricity, then dodges the startled swing of his beak and crackles again, trying to dare him into chasing her, or zapping her, or both. When he turns about to chase her she shrieks in delight and zooms off, still sparking.

(bel now)
(twitch can be summoned back via phone or yelling)

 

You grin at Lu's reaction. It's everything you'd hoped for. "It might have some competition in the cuteness department, look at that." You gesture out the kitchen window, which has a nice view of the aviary. Twitch and your lusus are playing tag, and Twitch is shrieking laughter like a little pupa.

(lu now)

 

You take one look at your pale sis and wibble your fucking head off. Without realizing it, your hands have drifted up to curl under your chin and your eyes are all teary. Just, damn, look at her zipping all about like some happy sparky bee--not the killer ones, but those big fuzzy ones that make the low buzz and bump into you softly all curious--and that bird is very obviously hankering for a romp, just look at those happy puffed feathers. You can feel his delight radiating like a tiny sun all the way from over here, and you think that if you weren't on the verge of falling asleep on your feet, you'd probably go out and join them.

But you're way tired, and you're a mess, and you're alone with a mostly-stranger blueblood. "That is being definitely way fuckin' cuter," you agree.

You think you're possibly in danger of just kinda flopping down on the nearest halfway-comfortable spot and quietly expiring until Twitchy gets back, but that would be flat out rude to do in front of Bel and you were raised better than that. (Times like these, you can practically see your mom lifting her big bulbous eyeballs at you in disapproval.) So instead you politely turn away and begin peeling your disgusting clothes off. It takes a long time, as there are a lot of layers and you are exhausted and clumsy and your teeth are chattering, but you manage. That done, you wipe off with a clean shirt--there wasn't much that actually got on you, thank your lords for small favors--and crawl inside your new friend's moirail's sushi coat.

It smells really nice.

You turn back toward Bel, your clothes held carefully away from the sushi coat, and look around wearily. "Uhh, bro, where can I all be putting these at?"

 

"Under the counter next to the kitchen sink, the box with the round window, just chuck them in there. Don't start it yet, I want to put in a load of towels." The kettle boils, and you pour steaming water through a strainer full of herbs. "Hey, this actually smells right," you comment proudly. Toss the kid a smile. "Pancho, my moirail, she's the one who's good at herbology and cooking, but she tries to teach me occasionally. We've got, uh, ginger, for your stomach, obviously, yerba mate, lemon verbena, and peppermint. I am kind of guessing on proportions and steeping time, though, so please forgive me if it tastes funny." You take the strainer out, stir in some honey, and slide the mug down the counter toward her.

 

"'Kay." You wobble in the direction he indicated and put your clothes in the little window machine. Personally you're glad to see that outfit go away for awhile, it's got bad vibes attached. Maybe the detergent will wash them out.

You crack a little smile at him when he remarks about the tea. Once he slides it your way, you wrap your hands around the mug eagerly and sit down with it, blinking back woozy feelings and holding it close like it's a precious treasure. It's almost too hot to hold, but you don't care, it's warm and he made it for you and he even put honey in it, how is this guy for real? "Awwww, dude, you're awesome. And you're even all like to be making this all fancy and shit. Me, I just dump the leaves in and drink the tea and then eat the leaves." You don't tell him that part of the reason you did this is because it annoyed the everloving shit out of your ex. Besides, you like getting all up and personal with that green roasty smell living up in your snort ducts, it's like tasting a color.

Impatient for it to cool, you blow on it. This gives you an excuse to gather your floaty thoughts together. You decide you don't want to fret more about what happens next, nope, that can happen when it happens . You also kinda get the impression he'd get uncomfortable with more gibbering thank-yous, as much as you kind of want to hug him for making you this. "Pancho, huh? She's sounding like a real knockout gal, what else she get up to?" you say, smiling, and take a tiny sip. "Gklrk." What happens in your mouth is something you can't quite describe--it's like all the teas he put in there got together and decided to beat up your head. It's not a bad taste, especially not with the honey in it, just... intense. Very intense.

Not wanting to offend him, you emit the tiniest cough and blink away tears. "S'good shit." you rasp, and take another sip, and another, and another. Once you get used to it, you find you kind of want the intensity.

 

"I brewed it too strong, didn't I," you chuckle mournfully. "I guess it's extra medicinal?"

You get out the fixings for some simple sandwiches and join her at the table to start building a stack of them. Even if the girls don't want them, it's never a bad idea to have a few PBJ's on hand. Since she asked about your moirail, you have no trouble making conversation. "Pancho? Is awesome. She's a frontline medic, totally fearless, great reputation, could've fast-tracked to Sergeant Major at least, but asked for a transfer just to be with me. The Sunslammer's a dead-end posting, you know. It's where they send the embarrassments. She said she doesn't care, she'd rather be here." You're glowing with a kind of baffled pride, still not at all sure how you lucked out like this.

 

"Heheh, must be!" you say and take a longer swallow, honeyed ginger and mint temporarily overwhelming your senses. It burns going down in a good way, but your hands tremble slightly holding the cup. It feels very heavy. Carefully, you sit it down and rest your head on your arms. The sleeves of the robe make it very comfortable. You grin outright as he lights up talking about his moirail. "Daaaang. Well, not that I can even be blaming her, I dunno if I could stand to be away from my girl for long." Speaking of whom, you hear a giddy cackle from outside and grin wider, feeling something in your thorax go all fond and achy that your moirail is that dang happy. Your brows rise as he describes the ship and you snort. "Embarrassments, huh? Looks like my Lords up and sent me to the right place, hahahahahahaaa." You loop your fingers in the handle of the mug, just to feel the warmth of it, and ignore how your eyes throb from your little gigglefit. "God, I feel like shit. But hey, I ain't sickly like this all normalwise, you dig? Soon as I bounce back from this nonsense I'll go and make my ass useful, just you wait."

 

You want to ask her what happened, but she's finally relaxing a little and you don't want to get her hackles up again. "What kind of thing do you think you might want to do?" you ask instead. "I think I could get you on the books as a consultant, as long as it's not near any sensitive, Fleet-only tasks. We could use a hand with the green spaces, you like gardening? Or with lusus day care, or in food service like Twitch."